Wednesday 3rd May 2023: Saxmundham Men's 3 vs St John's 3
Our Men's 3rd team kicked off their summer league campaign by handing senior debuts to three teenagers; Blake, Finnley and Linus (debut at only 13!) who have all come through the junior squads over the years, and currently are part of the club's weekly Teen Tennis group that runs 5-6pm every Friday.
With each junior pairing up with the likes of Woody, Roger and Matt, they were certainly in good hands to go out and enjoy their tennis. Opposition for tonight for a home game was St John's 3rd team, who turned up with three very good pairs. In all the Sax lot competed well and no junior looked out of place at all and impressively managed to battle bravely with no set being lost by more than 4-8!
On the surface an 8-1 loss looks a drubbing; however, when you factor-in two lost tie breaks and four other sets lost by small margins then in reality this game could have gone either way, so hats off to Blake, Finnley and Linus. A special mention also goes to Finnely and Roger, for securing the only set that night.
Monday 8th May 2023 - Roundwood Men's 2nd team vs Saxmundham Men's 3rd team
Our Men's 3rd team was straight back on it a few days later, with an away trip to Ipswich. Pairs that night were Roger/Mark, Lawrence/Bill and Finnley/Matt. The number one pair on the night, Mark and Roger, would have a fairly comfortable night winning two sets with ease and losing one set to Roundwoods' strong number one pair.
Our second pairing of Lawrence and Bill had a storming night and also bagged two sets out of the three in fine form. The two sets they won looked like a real battle with one going 8-6 and the other going all the way to a tie-break.
With the first two pairs doing a fantastic job to put Sax 4-2 up, it was down to the third pair of Finnley and Matt to try and get the team over the line.
The first set was a struggle which they ended up losing 4-8, luckily they bounced back well though, to take the next set 8-4, mostly thanks to mesmerising play from Finnley, and in-particular his solid forehand strokes which were loaded with topspin, and which consistently landed deep into the court, applying all kinds of pressure onto the opposition.
The final set would be the most enjoyable, with a real ding-dong of a set with no punches pulled from either pair. The game went to the wire and it would be the most experienced of the lot to crack under the pressure and be a plum by volleying into the net on match point in the tie break at 6-5 up! This was then very quickly lost, however, luckily Sax had already secured the overall win to get their first points of the campaign with a fine 5-4 result.
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